Plastic Planet

When I was a child, my grandfather worked in the German plastics industry. He used to bring me great presents, shiny, bright-colored and pliable. The great advantage of plastic is that it is cheap and convenient since it is lighter than other materials and can assume all types of shapes and sizes. In 1999 I read in a Dutch newspaper that fish in a river were dying due to a substance released by waste plastic that had ended up in the water. Since then, I’ve read more and more articles on the danger caused by the use of plastic and I’ve been struck by the fact that they are always followed up by reports saying how innovative, eco-friendly and fantastic plastics and other mand-made materials are.

This is why I decided to make Plastic Planet. My documentaries reflect my personal search for answers. Making an investigative film for me means embarking on a personal journey. I don’t create propaganda films to say, “Hi, let me show you how the world really works …” Plastic Planet is my need to discover what is happening to our planet. I’ve been threatened many times in my career. When you decide to make documentaries on burning issues, opponents get in touch with you in a variety of ways, sometimes unpleasant. At the moment, man-made materials and other industries that depend on plastics are in confrontation mode: so I’ll simply don my bulletproof jacket and see what happens! If I could only just persuade people to reflect on the subject, to try to buy less plastic, and be more mindful, that would be fantastic. To spectators I’d say: Find out more. Ask shopkeepers what’s behind all this and why plastic packaging fails to list all the toxins that are inside food. EC legislation envisages that consumers can be informed, but they don’t know it.